Classes get in the way of college

Hey Bro Montanas,

I'm back at ND, and it's sad that none of you are around (except Rachel, who I saw a few days ago, and Lauren, who I saw the other day, and Ale, who I didn't see the other day but I know is here, and Bridget, because nobody is really sad that she is gone). Anywho, classes started today, and I'm in a deep depression out of it. I scheduled my last one last night (apparently you're supposed to do that before the night before classes start?), but I'm still not happy with my schedule, so I'll probably add and drop a few things before I get it right. In honor of Jeremy, I may even add and drop a German or a French class. You'll all be happy to hear that the bookstore is still committing highway robbery. I bought books for ONLY TWO of my classes yesterday, and my bill came to...$357. I'll update you on the total price when (if) I finish buying the others.

In closing, I may just end up dropping all my classes and living here. I decided that's probably the way to go.

It's been a while

Hey guys,
I read this pretty often but I don't write very much so I decided it's about time. Actually, I started one of these a few nights ago but it was late and I fell asleep. So here goes my second try. Quick rundown of my summer: it's been pretty good, minus the fact that I have no permanent employment yet. Anyway, I went to visit Rachel in Minnesota at the beginning of the summer and then went to Cleveland with Maya to help her switch apartments. I went to South Bend and Chicago in July with Brian, Megan and Abby... it was SO great to see you guys!! (I came across my socks from that classy bowling alley the other day, haha.) At the beginning of August, I went to Montana to visit Jeremy... the drive from my house wasn't actually that bad. We went to Yellowstone, so that was fun. And just last week, my parents and I moved Justin back to South Bend. It was so weird (and sad) to be back there and not be moving myself back. He lives in Regis Philbin's old room this year, so hopefully I'll meet him during a football weekend, haha. In the meantime, I've been working for my dad doing advertising sales and stuff. It's not bad. So yeah, that's about it. When will everyone be back for football games? I'm going back in two weeks for Nevada and I know that Reed and Brian will be there for sure... everyone should come for that one!! FLF reunion? Between my dad and I, we have tickets for a few more games as well, so I'll be back for a couple more this fall.
That's about it. This is pretty long. (That's what she said...?)
I miss you guys. A lot.

I cut open a dead person today

Today was the first day of anatomy lab. We got our table assignments and bodies. My group has a rather large man with very tough tissue. One of the profs said he has two ways of classifying how easily the people cut: either butter or steel wool. Our guy is steel wool. We cut open his back and started dissecting the skin away from some gross stuff. At the end of lab the prof that explained everything to us gave me an imaginary gold star on my forehead for my superior skinning skills. I felt special. Ishould probably try to learn a little more anatomy (such as what the gross stuff is really called) if I want to continue getting gold stars and such.
I am officially done w/ my first med school class- medicine and society. We had our final today. It was basically a stats class. not terribly difficult. I'm expecting that to change quite quickly.
I was looking at old pics today cause i'm trying to figure out which ones to hang up in my apartment and it made me miss everyone a lot. I never really thought about how weird it would be to go to a school other than notre dame and without you guys. I don't like it very much yet but i didn't like nd very much in the first month or so either. I'm very bitter about the fact that i'm supposed to be trying to make new friends when i already have you guys. It makes me feel like i'm expected to replace you guys which is ridiculous cause thats not whats expected and would never happen but when im pmsing and exhausted thats how it seems lol. I should really go to bed. I have to clean first cause my dad's bringing me a tv this weekend and my apartments kinda messy (shocking right?). nowhere near as bad as my room at school was though.
I'm sure there's more but im done typing now

I got a bartending job! Woo!

It's only part-time, but now I have two part-time jobs which means one full-time job, right?

part-time + part-time = full-time

See? I'm gonna do so good on the GRE math section.

The place is a restaurant attached to a local small zoo and is in the same building as the aquarium, but it's a really cool atmosphere- the dining area actually has a giant shark tank in the middle. So hoorah, one piece of my life figured out...

I'm on a Boat, Motherfucker!

Except instead of a yacht, I'm going hardcore on a canoe. I've got my swim trunks but no flippy floppies (Because open-toed shoes are a BAD idea for this trip). If you're on the shore, then you're sure not me-oh (Since I will be in places only reachable by canoe).

. . .

Ok, enough of that.

After only three days in civilization to recuperate from camp, I'm heading out on my canoe trip into the wilderness of Algonquin Provincial Park. To be honest, I'm actually kind of freaked out.

For 10 days, I am one of only two leaders completely responsible for the safety of seven scouts. At camp there's a full staff on hand to help out if shit hits the fan, but deep in the park you're more likely to see moose than people. There will be three Eagle Scouts (myself included) on this expedition, so we should be all right, but this is still way more responsibility than I'm used to.

What also freaks me out is the complete cut-off from communication. Even at camp, I can access the internet at the nearby town's library, and we actually got decent cell reception at our site this year. However on this trip, there is none of that. Remember that big power outage that knocked out electricity to most of the Northeast five years ago? Yeah, I don't. That happened while I was on this trip as a scout. When we got back, we didn't believe it had happened until we saw news articles first hand and experienced the rolling blackouts in town. Who knows what will go down this time I'm off the grid.

Yet as much as I'm freaked out, I'm also crazy excited. This trip was one of the highlights of my time in scouting. The scenery is beautiful (as long as it doesn't rain), and the park is the most pristine location I have ever seen. I would do this for free, but they're actually paying me to go! Who knows, if this whole aerospace thing doesn't quite work out, I might look into making a living doing this kind of stuff as an outdoor guide of some sort.

I hope you all have been having a great summer, and I wish I was better at keeping in touch. As I will be officially unemployed when I return, road trips might be in order. So if you live within a day's drive of Rochester, be ready for surprise visits.

... updates?

Just wanted to mention that my little sister will be going to ND next year, and will be living in a studio apt at TC. No idea what dorm she is affiliated with.

Oh, and I signed up for google voice so I have another number that I may or may not use a bunch (its 920-524-9658 - which is a wisconsin number).

address, dance, marriage, cholesterol, and football

Hey everyone!! I'm finishing up my last week in Texas before I visit chicago/nd and then head off into volunteer land. I was gonna make this post more fluid, but given the sad state of my packing preparations and my apparent hunger at the moment, I'm just gonna bang out this update and tell y'all that I miss you.

I have an address!!!! And housemates!!!! I'm living at 57 Glendale Place, Buffalo, NY 14208 with 3 other volunteers. Our phone number is 716-881-2905
Jamie how close is that to you???

That music video job I got won't be in production until September so I can't do it :'( But I'm still really happy about the audtition and how everything else went down. I think I'm about 75% sure that after service I'm gonna jump into dance in Chicago and see if I can work for a company out there while I get stuff started.

As an homage to How I Met Your Mother, I wanna marry this guy pretty much based on the story of how we met. Short story: On a service trip to mexico senior year of highschool. Don't see each other for 5 years. End up sitting at the same table at a restaurant through a serendipitous string of events. I'm just saying, I think it's pretty cool... but we went out yesterday and I found out he wears Nike... so needless to say, I will not be proposing.

So I found out I have high cholesterol. WTH?!?!?! And a random extra bone of some sort in my wrist. I am either falling apart or slowly gaining super-powers.

Also, I did MAN ticket lottery for the Nevada game. I can buy two tickets, but I don't know if I'd even be able to make the game. Anyone in dire need of some tickets or know someone who wants to buy tickets really badly? I have til the 14th to buy them, but they're 80 bucks bc the extra money goes to the alum network. Lemme know and I can hold em.

Also, what is everyone up to? What are future plans/updates?

Peace all.

Romance, Drama and Unemployment

hey so
i was finally able to figure out how to get into this blog again hahahah woohoo!

anyway, quick tiny summary of my life since graduation (the good, the bad and the ugly)

so you all should probably know that kevin and i aren't dating anymore, right? we broke up like a week before graduation. after graduation i went to NYC with family and aedan came all the way from Portland to hang out (he has family in NYC). we hit it off because i no longer felt like i had to purposely be a bee-atch to him (i guess it was my way of distancing myself from him). got to know him in a different light and yeah... we started dating.

from the very beginning i told aedan that i would have to leave panama in a week so, was this a good idea? bla bla bla, it was all very much spontaneous (and quite romantic i might say, it was friggin sightseeing in NYC!). he ended up convincing me to go to Portland and meet his family (yikes!). i had a blast!

we broke up when i came back to panama. but we missed each other so much that we got back together in like 2 days. but then 2 weeks later i felt like i was lying to myself and that this wasn't really gonna work out (him being in college and me starting my career in a different country and whatnot)

anyway, yeah that's that.... i haven't been single for more than a month in 6 long years, so it's pretty exciting? i'm happy. aedan and i are still good friends. and i'm glad to say that after much much drama kevin and i are friends too. i feel like i need to grow on my own for a while, do some soul searching or something.

ANYWAY, romance and drama aside, i'm looking for a job in my country. so far many companies are interested but a lot of them don't have vacancies and the rest of them are taking long to get back to me (people are slow in this country). in the mean time i'm just working on little projects like organizing my room (which has been neglected for about 30 years) and cooking.

I MISS YOU ALL, besos y abrazos!